When a friend or family member passes away, their loved ones may decide to inter the body of the deceased at a site within a cemetery. In some instances, the deceased may be placed within a plot of land signified by a physical headstone demarcating the deceased's burial location. For these cemeteries, if the cemetery is large, such as through expansion over time or by originally having a large plot of land, there may be a plethora of headstones and mausoleums populating the cemetery. In these cases, a simple map may be provided at the entrance indicating only broadly described areas within the cemetery. Thus, it may be up to those visiting the cemetery to wander about within that broad area to find the specific burial location they are looking for.
Even for small cemeteries, a multitude of paved paths and headstones may tend to populate the cemetery over the course of time after many deceased persons are buried there. While the headstones may make it readily identifiable where a person has been buried, a significant amount of clustering of headstones may result from the number of deceased interred at the cemetery. In areas with limited space, the cemetery may choose to maximize the number of plots possible while still providing a reasonable plot size. This maximization may result in some unpleasant clutter if each headstone is situated in close proximity to other headstones. Moreover, a significant amount of heat may be trapped within the cemetery as a result of the sun heating the concrete, marble, and other materials used for headstones and/or any asphalt that may pave a multitude of pathways. Further still, some communities may be sensitive to the sight of a cemetery, and having a large number of headstones may make the land readily identifiable as a cemetery, which might affect the value of land surrounding the cemetery.
Accordingly, while other systems and methods have been made and used to identify the locations of interred loved ones, it is believed that no one prior to the inventors has made or used an invention as described herein.
The drawings are not intended to be limiting in any way, and it is contemplated that various embodiments of the technology may be carried out in a variety of other ways, including those not necessarily depicted in the drawings. The accompanying drawings incorporated in and forming a part of the specification illustrate several aspects of the present technology, and together with the description serve to explain the principles of the technology; it being understood, however, that this technology is not limited to the precise arrangements shown.